DER SCHEIN TRÜGT

German, "the appearance deceives"

I'm standing on an empty road all by myself. The sun is shining brightly. And the clock that's never wrong says it's twelve. Then I wonder, is it noon or midnight? -- Awaken (2020)

Weeks turned to months. Months turned to a year, then two years. In between dodging each other's assassination attempts, Diarnlan and Karandren continued the search for the hole in the veil. The underwater hunt proved futile. Now they'd moved to searching the air.

"I'm just saying, it would be much easier if--"

"No. We're not getting a hot air balloon."

Karandren pouted and went back to stirring his porridge. Diarnlan waited for him to eat it. He waited too. There was a brief silence.

"Did you poison the porridge?" Karandren asked, eyeing his bowl suspiciously.

"Not this time. Did you?"

He shook his head and shovelled a spoonful into his mouth. At once an expression of utter disgust crossed his face. He got up, stalked over to the sink, spat out the porridge, and rinsed his mouth out. Diarnlan watched with a smile. She pointedly ate a spoonful of her own porridge.

Karandren turned and glared at her. "You said you didn't poison it!"

"Pepper isn't poisonous."

He picked up the pepper pot and threw it at her bowl. She knocked it aside easily.

Karandren glared again and stormed out of the kitchen. Diarnlan waited for his inevitable retaliation. Minutes passed and nothing happened. She took another spoonful of porridge. Then she yelled and dropped it.

The spoon and her bowl were crawling with worms.

She picked it up gingerly, stalked down the hall to Karandren's room, and flung it through the door.

There was only one good thing about being sent back to an earlier time. The skrýszel didn't attack. Diarnlan woke up every morning expecting to hear the only-too-familiar crash of their footsteps. Every morning she heard nothing but the sea and the birds flying overhead -- and sometimes Karandren doing gods-knew-what in his room. Judging by the metallic screeching and earth-shaking explosions that issued from it at random moments, he was doing his best to blow them sky-high.

"This disproves your theory," Diarnlan said during one relatively peaceful meal. (Relatively peaceful for them meant no poisoning attempts, nothing added to the food, and no efforts to murder each other with the cutlery.) "The skrýszel aren't aware of the time-loop."

Karandren pouted. "We don't know that yet! Maybe they're waiting to lull us into a sense of false security before they strike!"

He struck the table to emphasise his words and knocked his plate of mashed potatoes onto his lap. Diarnlan rolled her eyes.

Diarnlan borrowed a boat -- or "borrowed" since she didn't bother to ask permission -- one evening and searched around where the skrýszel had always appeared. She cast spells to pick up any trace of unusual magic. All she got out of it was a nasty cold.

Surprisingly Karandren didn't try to kill her while she was bedridden and sniffling. Instead he sat beside her and talked about every stupid idea that came into his head. She would have preferred an assassination.

"I think we should find a dragon and get it to fly us over the sea."

Diarnlan's throat was too sore to speak. She glared at him, trying to telepathically broadcast how utterly ridiculous this idea was.

"Think of it. Even if we didn't find the hole in the veil, we'd have a dragon to kill the skrýszel for us."

And how do you intend to find a dragon? Diarnlan mouthed.

Karandren either didn't understand or simply refused to answer. "And anyway, I like dragons."

Diarnlan picked up an empty box of tissues and threw it at his head.

Things went wrong so quickly that it was impossible to point to the moment when they started. Diarnlan and Karandren were so busy bickering amongst themselves and keeping an eye on the place where the skrýszel usually appeared that they completely forgot about all the other holes in the veil. The one in the farmyard, for example, and the jǫtunn that came through it.

Both of them avoided notice as much as possible. Instead of going to the village for food they went to the nearest large town, or even further afield if they thought someone might recognise them. They were technically runaways, after all, and Diarnlan would be in trouble for theft if anyone from the academy caught her.

On the day when things went badly wrong Karandren dragged a lump of scrap metal out of his room.

"Look at this!" he shouted.

Diarnlan looked at it. There was nothing particularly noteworthy about it. "Are you setting up shop as a scrap metal dealer?"

Karandren scowled. "It's a mechanical dragon. Only instead of mechanics it's powered by magic. Watch!"

He placed his hand on the metal. Diarnlan watched in a mixture of exasperation and alarm as the lump of rubbish uncoiled like a snake. A long neck with a misshapen head formed at the front. A long tail formed at the back. Four legs that looked more like a seal's flippers took shape underneath it. The rest of it remained a mass of rusty old iron. There was nothing particularly dragon-ish about it. Even its head looked like nothing so much as a potato.

"Very intimidating," she said dryly. "What exactly do you intend to do with it?"

"Use it to fight the skrýszel, of course!"

Diarnlan pictured what would happen if Karandren actually sent this movable scrap-heap up against a skrýszel. She rolled her eyes. "It would be destroyed within seconds, idiot."

He refused to be daunted. "It isn't ready yet, but when it is it'll be an actual dragon. With fire and wings and everything!" He noticed her badly-hidden smile and his tone changed. "Wipe that stupid grin off your face or you'll be the first person it kills."

Diarnlan rolled her eyes again. "I'm going shopping. It's your turn to wash the dishes, and if they're not done when I get back I'll melt down your dragon and pour it over your head."

Five miles away on the other side of the village, a gigantic figure stepped through the veil. It paused and sniffed the air. Almost all full-blooded monsters had the ability to sense when something similar to them was nearby. ("Nearby", depending on the monster, could mean anything from one mile to one hundred.) The jǫtunn sensed the presence of something that wasn't quite a monster but also wasn't human.

It followed that presence towards the coast.

After tinkering with his invention for a little longer Karandren reluctantly got up to wash the dishes. Physically he was unfortunately still only a child, so to reach the sink he had to pull a chair over to it and stand on it.

For ten minutes he entertained himself by pretending he was back in Miavain and the dishes were priests. He held them under the water and imagined a drowning person's death throes. In the process he deliberately splashed as much water onto the floor as possible just to annoy Diarnlan when she got back. At last he tired of that and washed the remaining dishes as quickly as he could.

A distant thud made the plates rattle. Karandren blinked. His first thought was a skrýszel. Then the thud came again. Whatever it was, it came from inland and not from the sea. Thud. Thud. Strange. It sounded almost like... footsteps.

Karandren jumped off the chair and ran outside. He paused to tap his dragon on the head. It came to life and stumped out after him. He hadn't gotten around to giving it proper legs yet. But it had teeth -- several rows of them, made out of old rail spikes. He'd had gone to an awful lot of trouble to get his hands on them without Diarnlan finding out. If there was anything sinister going on around here, the dragon's teeth would soon put a stop to it.

The thuds continued. They grew louder and closer with each one. Karandren and the dragon waited. A huge figure appeared on the hill behind the house. It was more than twice as tall as Karandren would be when he reached his full height. Right now it looked as big as a mountain compared to him.

He glared up at the jǫtunn. "Not you again."

Jǫtnar were not known for their intelligence -- indeed there was some dispute over whether or not they could be considered sentient or simply animate blocks of ice -- but this one managed to convey surprise and utter confusion as it stared down at Karandren.

"I suppose this proves my theory," he muttered to himself. "Dragon! Attack!"

The dragon's legs weren't really designed for running. Karandren had to help it along with a bit of dark magic. But it certainly knew how to use its teeth. The jǫtunn stared at it blankly as it hurtled towards it. Then the dragon opened its mouth and sank its teeth into the brute's leg. Blood sprayed everywhere.

The jǫtunn roared. It raised its other leg and brought its foot crashing down on where the dragon had been a minute ago. It missed. Karandren directed the dragon to jump at the creature's throat.

It leapt. Time seemed to slow down as it hurtled towards the jǫtunn. Karandren helped it on with a steady stream of dark magic. Then the jǫtunn's enormous hand closed around the dragon. Karandren watched in horror as it crushed his creation into fragments of metal.

He was too young to effectively use a weapon even if he managed to get his hands on one. His only option now was to run. So he ran.

The jǫtunn caught up with him before he'd gone far.

Diarnlan reached the turn onto the main road before she realised she'd forgotten her shopping list.

"Damn it," she grumbled as she turned back.

A distant and very faint tremor ran through the ground as she turned. She barely noticed it, dismissing it as some construction work in the village. Only when she was about half-way back to the house did she realise something was truly wrong. A terrible and animalistic roar pierced the air.

Diarnlan almost jumped out of her skin. Instinctively she looked back, expecting to see some wild beast charging towards her. Then she realised. The noise had come from in front of her, from the direction of the house.

What has that idiot done this time?

She didn't quite run, but she walked as quickly as possible. When the house came into view she was briefly relieved to note it was outwardly intact. Then she saw the bright red stain on the road. And in the middle of the red was... something small and crushed almost beyond recognition. A pile of metal lay on the hill, next to a pool of viscous blue fluid.

Diarnlan skirted around the red thing, refusing to look too closely at it. She examined the metal and recognised it as the remains of Karandren's dragon. The blue liquid smelled like blood. A line of enormous footprints led away from the house and the-- The--

She forced herself to look at the blood and the mangled body lying in it. The face was too badly damaged to recognise, but she knew as well as she knew her own name that it was Karandren.

Cold fury welled up in her. I'm the only one who can kill him! I'm the only one allowed to kill him!

She went into the house, retrieved the sword she kept in her bedroom, and followed the footprints. When she caught up with the jǫtunn it had just killed a hapless cow. While it was distracted by eating the cow she sneaked up behind it and stabbed it in the back.

The sword bounced off its skin without piercing it. The jǫtunn roared. It swung its arm round and hit Diarnlan in the head.

"I'm sick of this place," Karandren announced flatly, staring up at the glowing tree. He turned to stare at Diarnlan. "How'd you get here so quickly? Did that brute kill you too?"

She nodded and didn't elaborate. "I suppose two years is a good record for us."

Karandren snorted. "Two years? Remember when we managed over ninety years? That only happened when I went to Miavain. I think it's the key to surviving."

"Go to Miavain as many times as you like," Diarnlan snapped, "but don't drag me along next time."

"Why not? I think we worked pretty well together in our latest lifetime. We didn't even kill each other this time. And my theory was right. The skrýszel are aware of the time-loop." In response to Diarnlan's disbelieving look he explained, "The jǫtunn shouldn't have attacked for another eight years. Something happened to make it change its plans."

Diarnlan glared at him. "Until I see actual solid evidence of the skrýszel changing their plans in response to our actions, I won't believe that theory."

Karandren shrugged. "Suit yourself. Now, what are we going to do in our next life? I say we should go to Miavain and stay there. Don't get involved with the skrýszel at all. And we'll see how long we live then."

"And what if you're sent back as a child again?"

"Then I'll make you do most of the conquering for me."

Diarnlan picked up Saungrafn, which was lying beside her as if it had been there all along, and whacked him with the blade's flat side. Karandren held up his hands.

"All right! We'll split it fifty-fifty. You can deal with the priests and politicians and I'll deal with everything else."

She whacked him again.